His Excellency the Minister of Health, Dr. Abdullah bin Abdulaziz Al-Rabeeah, began yesterday his official visit to the Republic of South Korea; in an endeavor to have a closer look at the services provided by the Korean educational and health institutions, and to discuss how to benefit from them in the health domains in the Kingdom.
The visit came in response to the desire of both sides to develop the health cooperation between them since signing the executive program for mutual cooperation in the health fields on February 8th, 2012. It is noteworthy that this visit coincides with the Korean medical conference, during which the Ministry of Health is to have the opportunity to provide a comprehensive overview of its strategic plan. As part of the visit program for Dr. Al-Rabeeah, he is to meet, with participation of the Saudi Ambassador in Seoul, the Korean Minister of Health and Welfare, Dr. Young Jin, as well as meetings with the officials in the health sector.
Moreover, Dr. Al-Rabeeah is also to visit some outstanding medical and educational institutions such as: Samsung Medical Center, Asan International Medical Center and National Center for Research.
During his five-day visit, Dr. Al-Rabeeah will discuss with his Korean counterpart a number of health issues of concern to both countries, including those proposed projects which both sides agreed to implement as twinning projects between health institutions in both countries. Meanwhile, the two sides suggested to choose Prince Sultan Cardiac Center (PSCC) in Najran and King Fahd Cardiac Center (KFCC) in Jeddah as pilot projects, and to begin running two months after the Ministry of Health’s final approval on the Korean proposal.
The two of them will discuss also initiating the Visiting Physician program, that is to be started with 15 specialists in the following medical specialties: cardiovascular diseases, neurosurgery, cancer, orthopedic and organ transplants, in addition to the project submitted by the Korean side related to health information technology and e-health program, which will begin to work in June 2013 if approved by the Saudi Ministry of Health.
Within the same vein, both Saudi and Korean sides are to touch upon training the health cadres of Saudi doctors, nurses and technicians, in order to begin it during the next two months. The Korean Ministry of Health agreed to sign a project of exchanging the technical expertise in six medical fields with King Fahd Medical City in December 2013.
It is worth mentioning that the delegation accompanying His Excellency the Minister of Health comprises the Vice Minister for Health Affairs, Dr. Mansour Al-Howasi, the Assistant Deputy Minister for Planning and Training, Dr. Mohammed Zamakhshari and a number of MOH officials.